Paul Wilson, assistant professor of art history, published an article entitled “Monumental Indifference in Tallinn” in the journal Public Art Dialogue.
Article Abstract:
If monuments are most visible at the moments of their creation, contestation or removal, what characterizes them between these events? We often assume that they are invisible to or forgotten by the public, but this analysis of Anu Pennanen’s short film Friendship (2006) distinguishes indifference from invisibility or forgetting. Set in Tallinn, Estonia, just before the controversial removal of the Soviet era, so-called “Bronze Soldier” statue, the film follows two groups of friends (one ethno-linguistically Estonian and the other Russian) as they move between the city’s abandoned communist monuments and its new Viru Centre shopping mall. Despite the historical and ideological distinctions between the monumental sites, the teenagers in the film use them almost identically. Their indifference functions as a critical strategy for resisting the ethnically divisive historical narratives inscribed on the urban landscape. Friendship helps us to understand indifference as a response to public art, reframing debates on whether or not to preserve or remove Soviet era monuments.
Article link.
For free access to the full article, please email Paul: pwilson@ithaca.edu.
